Monopoly o f
the Fur Trade. .a-bulilheJ.
emprefs. (who,, amidft many excellent regulations which:
characterife her reign, has fhewn herfelf invariably attentive
to the improvement of the Ruffian commerce)
abolifhed, in 1762, the,monopoly of the fur trade, and
renounced in favour of her fuhjeQs the exclufive privilege
which the crown enjoyed of fending caravans to
Pekin *•. By thefe conceffions the profits of the trade;
have been conficferably encreafed : the great expence,
hazard, and. delay, of tranfporting the merchandife occa-
fionally from the frontiers of Siberia to Pekin, has been
retrenched ; and Kiachta is now rendered the center
of the Ruffian and Chinefe commerce..
* S.R.G. VIII. p. S.
Sm